New gas stations causing friction

Sunday

In the 1990s, it seemed like drug-store chains competed for every free corner across central Ohio. Some neighborhoods fought the chains but usually ended up with a pharmacy anyway.

More than a decade later, there's a new player fighting for a place on our street corners -- gasoline stations. Kroger wants to put its Turkey Hill Minit Markets in neighborhoods across central Ohio so its customers can use their fuel discounts close to home.

The company plans to open five to 10 of the gas station/convenience stores in the region this year, a spokeswoman said. More will follow.

It's not quite the free-for-all that saw pharmacy chains building across the street from one another. But as Turkey Hill seeks corners on busy streets, the chain is encountering opposition from neighbors who don't want a 24-hour gas station in their backyards.

Last week, residents of a Northeast Side neighborhood lost one skirmish when Turkey Hill won a 4-2 vote of the Columbus City Council that allows the chain to build a gas station up against residential property lines.

Another fight is brewing in Clintonville, where neighbors are opposing a planned Turkey Hill gas station on the northwest corner of Westview Avenue and N. High Street.

The site is in Columbus, but the adjoining neighborhood is in Sharon Township. The township trustees voted to oppose the gas station after they couldn't find one resident who supported it, said John Oberle, trustee chairman.

"We had a community meeting, and we talked to the developer, and they were very professional," Oberle said. "But the residents really do not want it there."

The Clintonville Area Commission's Zoning and Variance Committee is expected to consider the project soon. By their nature, said Jennifer Cowley, a member of the committee, putting gas stations next to houses is a tough sell.

"Any gas station that would come in is going to have some challenges anywhere in Columbus where you have infill sites," said Cowley, an associate professor of city and regional planning at Ohio State University.

Turkey Hill works with neighbors on proposed stores, said Erin Dimitriou Smith, a company spokeswoman.

"When we enter a market, we consider the community our neighbors," she said. "We meet with them to overcome their opposition. We want them to be happy that we're there."

Turkey Hill is building stores in areas where there was no controversy. One is nearly completed in Whitehall, and another proposal went through without a hitch on Morse Road near the former Northland Mall.

On the Northeast Side, though, residents in a subdivision called the Preserve, off N. Hamilton Road, fought Turkey Hill for more than a year. And they didn't back down when the company offered to build a buffering wall, change its lights and make sure no deliveries would come at night.

The Northland Community Council, which had supported the Turkey Hill station on Morse Road, opposed the one on Hamilton Road as too close to the neighborhood.

Dozens of residents showed up at the Columbus City Council meeting last Monday to fight the change that would allow fuel pumps on the site. They left bitter after the council approved the project.

Council President Michael C. Mentel didn't attend the vote, because his nephew, Sean Mentel, lobbied the council for the store's developer. Sean Mentel does not represent the company in the Clintonville zoning issue.

Councilman A. Troy Miller, named leader of the council's zoning committee this month by the council president, told residents he was voting for the change because the next developer might not offer concessions such as the buffer wall. That was echoed by council members Andrew J. Ginther, Hearcel F. Craig and Eileen Paley, who also voted for the change.

But Nichelle Nobile, whose backyard looks out on the Turkey Hill site, said anything allowed under the original zoning would be better than a gas station.

It would "not (be) a 24-hour fueling station that comes with increased crime and the noise, the pollution and the property-value depreciation," she said.

Councilwoman Priscilla Tyson, who was zoning chairwoman last year, worked extensively on the N. Hamilton Road issue. She said she realized the neighborhood would never accept the project.

She and Councilwoman Charleta Tavares voted against allowing a gas station.

"I voted against it because there was so much opposition to it," she said. "I was thinking about it just being up there day and night."

She said the vote doesn't necessarily create a precedent for the next fight.

"Each situation is different, and I think you just have to look at what history has been there," she said. "There are communities where you have gas stations next to homes and they're OK with that."

dcaruso@dispatch.com

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